A Name Written In The Stars
by ClinicDuty101
Summary: Afterlife  What if it had been Alison who had the brain tumour and appeared to Robert?


A Name Written In The Stars

Robert Bridge was sat in his boat house whilst drinking some wine and relaxing. He'd had a hard days lecturing and now he was savouring the rest of the day with a glass of wine and some music softly playing in the background.

What he did not expect was Alison to be standing at the stairs looking lost.

He turned round and came out with "Alison, I didn't know you were coming round. Why didn't you call?"

For a moment she seemed to ignore him before fixing her gaze onto his face.

"Call?" she asked confused. "How could I call?"

"Is your phone broken or something?" he asked worried about the state she was in. He knew Alison was odd but she was acting more oddly than he'd ever known her to act.

"No, it's fine. It's just..." Alison didn't get to finish her sentence because she had disappeared.

Robert gaped at the spot where she had been standing, he was sure he was awake. He pinched his arm and walked over to his own phone and dialled Alison's number.

His heart started beating wildly against his chest and the phone kept ringing and ringing but there was no answer. So he decided to grab his coat and make his way over to Alison's house.

He sped through the streets of Bristol to her house where he continued to knock on the door for ten minutes screaming out her name.

A thoroughly disturbed neighbour emerged from her home and interrupted him.

"You won't find her in there!" she said irritably. "She hasn't been there since this afternoon."

"Thank you." Robert replied as he dashed back into his car and headed back to his boat.

When he arrived home he started ringing round the hospitals asking whether Alison had been brought in.

He finally found the hospital Alison had been taken in by, but the receptionist wouldn't give him any details over the phone because he wasn't a relative.

"All I can say sir is that she is now stable." The receptionist told him.

"What happened? Can't you tell me that?"

"You're not a family member sir."

"I'm coming down there now and I want to see her!" he shouted as she put down the receiver and headed for his car once again.

Alison had come to see him for a reason and he was going to find out why.

Robert arrived at the hospital and found out the ward Alison was on the nurse seated him next to Alison's bed.

"What's she here for?" Robert asked the nurse.

"She suffered a brain haemorrhage on a bus." She replied as she checked Alison's vitals.

"A brain haemorrhage?"

"Yes. It seems that her brain tumour has been getting larger. A pedestrian checked her bag for the medication she has supposed to be taking and the bottle had been unopened."

Robert gulped and took Alison's hand in his own. Why hadn't she told him about this? Why had she refused to take her medication? Why was she dying? He needed her more than he needed anyone else in his life.

He fell asleep only to wake up a few hours later. Robert woke up and looked at the pale face of Alison Mundy.

She looked peaceful and just as if she were sleeping if he excluded that amount of tubes that she had inserted into her, almost like a fairy tale princess waiting to be woken up by her prince.

He kissed her hand as a tear slid down his cheek.

"I know I never got round to telling you this..." he started "but I love you. It's taken me over two years now to admit, but here I am saying it now. If you can hear me you must know that I'm feeling pretty sceptical about the whole talking to someone whilst they're in a coma thing but in a way it helps. You can't leave me Alison, there's so much more I need to know, about you, about what you go through every day. Two years just seems too short, to me it seems like two weeks or months. Time just seems to fly by when I'm with you." He paused hoping no one could hear him spilling his heart out to her comatose body, he felt stupid enough as it is. "Did I ever thank you for seeing Josh over to the other side? I don't think I did." He smiled "and yes I know what you're thinking, I am a believer." Robert then stopped and remembered how he'd got here in the first place. "Why did you come to see me?"

A light flickered behind him and Robert turned around to see another Alison standing like she had been at his boat.

"I came to see you because I couldn't leave without looking into your eyes one last time." Alison replied giving him a small smile.

Robert blinked hardly believing what was happening but he embraced it because he knew that her time was coming soon.

"So you love me huh?" Alison asked, that small smile still playing on her lips.

"Yeah." He replied looking down.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of Robert. Although I think I always knew in a way."

"This isn't some kind of game Alison! You're dying and all you can tell me is that you knew how I felt?"

"Oh, did you not know?" Alison replied as the smile fell from her face.

"Know what?"

"That I love you too."

He looked at her with a penetrating gaze trying to figure out if she was lying or not.

"I just couldn't admit it because you were back together with Jude."

He froze, he'd forgotten about Jude. He hadn't realised how it would look to Alison if he got back with Jude. It looked to her as if he was still in love with her.

"I didn't think that you..."

"You didn't think that I loved you? Wow, that quote is true "love is blind." Well how could I tell you when you were shacked up with another woman? Don't you think it was hard enough being around you all the time and not being able to tell you the way I felt? Every time I was with you my heart beat as if I'd run a hundred miles. I couldn't smile in case I gave away how I felt. I was in so much agony when you returned to be with Jude, so I gave up on you."

"I'm sorry Alison, if I knew how you felt this wouldn't have happened." Robert apologised, Alison's face softened. "But why didn't you tell me about the brain tumour?"

"Because you have enough on your plate without me dying to top it all."

"But I could've been there for you, supported you."

"You needed to support Jude and Morgan; I would've been in the way of that."

"But I don't care about anything but you."

"When I go you'll have others to care about. You'll have Jude, you'll have Morgan and you can have that family that you started out with. I know that losing Josh was a huge blow to you and Jude and you've both moved on from your grief but look, you can start over again and I won't be in the way of that anymore."

"But I don't want to lose you." He said as his voice strained.

"Losing someone is a part of life Robert. But I'll always be with you in memory and someday in death as well." She walked as close to him as possible and kissed him on the lips.

Although Robert could not kiss back he felt a tingle in his lips where she'd kissed him.

The heart monitors started to signal that Alison's heart was failing. The nurses and a doctor dashed over to Alison's bedside as they performed CPR.

Robert stood in the middle of the room and watched Alison as she smiled and turned away from him. Just before she had turned Alison had said.

"I'll be with you Robert, no matter what."

Robert turned to look at Alison's body and the doctor informed him.

"She's gone."

Robert let another tear slide from his eye as he replied.

"I know."

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Alison had left a note within her house that instructed Robert to cremate her and spread the ashes by the sea.

With a heavy heart he held a small service for Alison in which he, her father and some of the family's she had helped attended.

Jude had decided to attend with him for emotional support but all he could think about was Alison.

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A year after Alison's death Robert had published his book about her. In tribute he had included her coming to him on the night of her death.

He had only included what had happened in the boat, what had happened in the hospital had been between him and Alison.

Jude had also gotten pregnant again and a couple of days after the book had been released she produced a baby girl.

When Robert had suggested the name Alison for the baby Jude had been rather apprehensive. But she gave in when she remembered how close he was to her.

Robert's book had been a bestseller for about a week, but he didn't care about the money he just wanted Alison's story to be out there for everyone to know and decide amongst themselves if the worlds of life and death where interlinked or worlds apart.

Some days Robert liked to think that he'd caught glimpses of Alison, that she'd come back just to remind him that she was still there for him, watching over him and little Alison.

He was firmly a believer and it was all down to her, the woman that he really loved.

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